Raising fish is a hobby of ever increasing popularity. The hobby includes raising simple gold fish in a bowl to raising and breeding salt water fish in a complex ecosystem that is carefully controlled. Millions of dollars are spent annually on this hobby.
Since fishes are cold blooded or poikilothermous vertebrates, they are unable to regulate their body temperatures against the prevailing water temperature around them. As a result, their metabolism tends to become sluggish if the water temperature drops, and in the majority of fishes, the blood is at approximately the same temperature as the surrounding water and heat generated by muscular action can be rapidly lost by the animal.
Thus, as is well appreciated by most serious fish collectors, the temperature conditions in which the fish is being kept should be carefully controlled and regulated. Accordingly, there are several designs for heaters, and other such water temperature controlling devices that are suitable for use in an aquarium.
While these devices work quite well in the aquarium environment, the present inventors have found that many fish are damaged or destroyed due to extreme temperature fluctuations occurring in the water during transportation of the fish from the store to the owner's aquarium. This transit time can be anywhere from a few minutes to an hour or more.
The fish is generally removed from the store's aquarium, placed in a bag, transported, and then transferred to the owner's aquarium. Even if the end points of this journey are carefully controlled, the middle thereof, i.e., the transport period, is generally not so controlled. This middle portion of the transfer process can expose the fish to extremes in temperature that are caused by both the differences in temperature of the environment and due to the capturing of energy in the water due to an absorption of sun's rays into the bag.
It is this middle portion of the transfer process that has remained uncontrolled.
While the inventors are aware of many bags that can be used to contain fish, the inventors are not aware of any bag that can control the environment in a manner that is required for the safe transport of fish in a temperature controlled manner.
Accordingly, there is a need for a bag that can be used for containing and transporting live fish in a controlled and safe environment.